The Passing of Time
by GWTW forever
Summary: It has been over a decade since Rhett left and the Butler family are doing well. this story begins in the present and reviews the past through a series of flashbacks. Read and review! tell me if you like it...or if you don't! Chapter 4 is up
1. Chapter 1

"No

"No! there is no way I'm going to permit this happening! I am the man of this household and I get the final say on what happens to those who live in it!" Rhett was fuming, waving his arms around as he paced. Scarlett observed how ridiculous he looked in his huff and felt a laugh bubble to her lips but quelled it with some trouble. Coughing to cover herself she caught Rhett's attention but as he glanced swiftly at her, her face was a study of placidity and slight enquiry.

"How can you be so calm about this? Don't you understand what's happening? She's throwing her life away!" the volume of Rhett's voice was increasing with each impassioned word.

"hush Rhett, the whole house will hear you. She's a big girl anyhow, you can no longer tell her how to live her life. She can make her own decisions, particularly those concerning the heart", Scarlett settled herself more comfortably on the chaise, realising that this conversation wasn't going to end anytime soon.

"A big girl? Why she's just a baby!" Rhett looked at Scarlett with incredulity, "and by God, as long as I'm her Father and she's living under our roof I will tell her anything I please!"

"Rhett", Scarlett said calmly hoping to placate him "Ella isn't so young. She's been going to balls for years now and she is older than I was when I first got married".

"Yes, and we all know how well that worked out for you" Rhett replied with a slight sneer, God help him, he stilled loved goading her after all these years.

"Don't be hateful Rhett. Mine wasn't a marriage of love, at least not on my behalf. Ella is in love, and to a wonderful boy. I don't understand why you're so hesitant"

"Scarlett, as much as I like and admire Beau Wilkes, I just cannot reconcile the fact that Ella wants to marry a Wilkes! Why couldn't Beau have followed family traditions and marry one of his cousins?" Although Rhett could admit to himself that Beau wasn't much like his father and seemed to inherit many of his mother's redeemable qualities, it irked him that his daughter would choose the path that Scarlett had once wanted so desperately to travel.

"Well Rhett, as far as I see it, you don't really have much of a choice. Everyone else seems quite keen on this match, after all they are well suited. Anyhow you don't want to push Ella away, that might encourage them to elope, heaven forbid! Can you imagine the scandal?" Scarlett asked in mock dismay

While having regained their sense of respectability and gentility in the eyes of the old guard and once again being wholeheartedly accepted into polite society, there was rarely anything more enjoyable to Rhett and Scarlett than mocking the behaviours and proprieties of the institution that once cast them out. In the privacy of their own home of course.

Rhett threw his head back and laughed for the first time since hearing about Ella's engagement. "My Dear, since when have you ever cared about whether something caused a scandal?"

"Fiddle-de-dee, _you_ might not be a gentleman Rhett but _I_ am now a lady and I would hate to have my reputation besmirched after all the effort I put in"

"If you really cared Scarlett, you would stop sticking out your tongue at Mrs Merriweather's behind her back after one of her arduous lectures" Rhett stated with a raised eyebrow

"Oh that old pea hen, who cares about her? Stop trying to change the subject Rhett, I want you to go and give Ella your blessing and congratulate Beau on making such a fine catch. There is nothing you can do. And besides Gabriella had her heart set on being the flower girl and I know how you would hate to disappoint your youngest daughter, angel that she is" Scarlett smiled innocently, knowing that her change in tact was inspired. Their youngest daughter Gabriella was the apple of Rhett's eye. Although no one could ever replace Bonnie, Gabriella's loving and affectionate nature, her ability to charm even the most hardened person, coupled with her willingness to please everyone around her, had helped fill the void that was left when Bonnie passed.

"Fine" Rhett grumbled, "I'll do it, but it won't please me one little bit" and with that he stalked out of the room to find the happy couple.

Scarlett smiled to herself and leaned into the cushions, musing that the last few years had been wonderful. She and Rhett had reconciled almost a year to the day after that terrible night when he left her and had finally become a proper family not the semblance of one. They had two more children, Gabriella and Jacob, who was their youngest and a little hellion. "Exactly like Rhett" Scarlett smiled fondly, recalling that Rhett preferred to say he had too much wild O'Hara blood in him.

For all Rhett's protestations that he never wanted a boy, he was overjoyed when Mammy presented him to Rhett, particularly with the striking resemblance he bore to his father, from his black hair to his swarthy skin, he was a miniature Rhett. Except for his eyes, they were pea green, just like his Mother's.


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: I own none of the characters

Disclaimer: I own none of the characters. Enjoy!

It was a gaunt and tired looking Scarlett who put mammy and her children on the train to Tara for the second time in as many months.

Although the children were frightened with everything that had happened recently, they knew better than to question their Mother about it, she seemed more confused than they were and it was hard to rely on someone for strength when she seemed completely drained of hers.

This scared Wade more than anything, though he kept silent about it. If there was one thing he could always have relied on his mother for, it was her strength. He had always had Melanie's kindness and devotion and Rhett's love and attention, all areas of which Scarlett was poorly lacking in regard to her children. Although now it seemed both of those mainstays were gone and now, when Wade needed his Mother's strength the most he found her lacking in that as well.

With a determination inherited from his Mother, Wade squared his shoulders against the tide of emotion that threatened to overtake him and with the realization that he was the only one Ella could truly depend on, his little heart hardened against further betrayal from those he loved. With childish reasoning, Wade could determine that everything he had relied on in life had deserted him, and in that moment he unconsciously began building a protective wall around his heart. A wall that would take years to crumble.

As Ella clung tightly to Mammy's hand and watched her Mother grow smaller and smaller until she disappeared, all she could think of was that she had done something wrong. She must have, for so many bad things to happen. Ella's life as she knew it had disappeared and in its place all she could feel was a strange emptiness that she couldn't quite comprehend.

I know this is quite short but I like Wade and Ella and I feel you should get some insight into their feelings

Please Review!!


	3. Chapter 3

Sorry about the last chapter, I know it may have seemed a little confusing and disjointed but that's how the story will progress mostly, present time one chapter, flashback the next. Rhett and Scarlett's relationship was never simple and it wasn't fluid so why should a story about their relationship be completely that way? 

This is another flashback, continued from the last, I hope its not too terrible…enjoy

**Disclaimer: I own none of the characters**

Watching the train Wade and Ella were on disappear into the distance, Scarlett squared her shoulders and read over the telegram she received from her Aunt Eulalie and Aunt Pauline, insisting that she stay with them for the duration of her trip. They were awfully lonely, they said. And after all nobody knew when Captain Butler was due back from his business trip, so she needn't worry about staying with him, they said. Scarlett sat down wearily on a bench nearby and waited for the train to Charleston.

* * *

As she pulled up in the carriage out the front of her Aunts house, she gathered all her courage and wrapped it around her like a protective cloak. She would get Rhett back, defeat wasn't an option. After all, she was Scarlett O'Hara, she always got what she wanted once she set her mind to it and she doubted that there was anything she had ever wanted quite so much.

* * *

Scarlett was excited to discover that a ball was being held two nights hence for some old pea-hen whose name she had forgotten, for some long-standing contribution to Charleston society. The details were irrelevant and truly she had blocked out her Aunt's droning voice after the word 'ball'. For although Rhett was away on business, surely, with him wanting to get back into the good graces of polite society, he wouldn't shun the first major ball of the season.

It was with this reasoning that Scarlett went about the next two days with a bounce in her step and the first sign of colour in her cheeks since Bonnie died. Although she was nervous about Rhett's reaction, the thought of seeing him again was overpowering everything else.

* * *

Rhett walked into the ballroom, bowing and calling out compliments to the ladies her passed, stopping and chatting politely to the matrons whose respect he was only just starting to earn. His eyes scanned the crowd, hoping to find a familiar face, when they landed on a face that was all too familiar and one he was not particularly pleased about seeing.

It was with a smile on his face but a building storm in his eyes, a promise of things to come, that he approached Scarlett and his mother, involved in what appeared to be quite a jovial conversation.

"Mother, Scarlett" he raised a questioning eyebrow in the latter's direction.

"What brings you to Charleston Scarlett? I thought you were quite happily ensconced in Atlanta, awaiting my return." Rhett shot her a warning look and Scarlett realized gleefully that he hadn't told his mother anything about their recent state of affairs. There was still hope!

"Fiddle-dee-dee Rhett, since when does a women need an excuse to pay a surprise visit to her husband. Besides, you know me, I could never pass up the opportunity to dance" Scarlett simpered with a flash of her dimple.

Rhett almost smiled at the act she was putting on. "Then shall we?" he asked putting out his arm to lead her onto the dance floor.

"Don't get the wrong idea Scarlett, I merely wanted to opportunity to talk to you without my mother hearing. Why are you really here?"

"I'm here to see you, just like I said. I refuse to believe that you don't love me anymore."

Scarlett's hand was resting against Rhett's chest as he spun her around the ballroom in a dizzying waltz. She could feel his heart beating underneath her fingertips. The heart she once had and lost, the heart she had unknowingly and repeatedly broken with her carelessness, the heart she now wanted with her entire being.

Scarlett hadn't realised she had been staring so intently at his chest until Rhett cleared his throat "Are you surprised to feel that its still beating?" Rhett questioned sardonically.

"You have that determined look in your eyes, well don't bother Scarlett, you won't be able to win me over, like I said, my love has worn out. There's nothing left for you here".

Scarlett was beginning to get a little anxious "Rhett, everything that you told me before you left, if only you had told me earlier! Oh, you must care; even if it's only a little, otherwise why would you reveal your feelings to me?"

"I don't care Scarlett, I am merely expressing these things to you now as I am able to do so without risking heartbreak. You see, had I revealed my feelings to you when I still cared, you would have destroyed me. My heart is no longer yours to crush and thus I am able to communicate my feelings to you"

"I don't understand!" Scarlett cried in desperation, "How can love just stop? Love isn't meant to end! If you loved me as much as you said you did, then there most be something left for me!"

"Scarlett, you never have been able to understand something if it wasn't stated plainly, although I don't know if I can say it any more plainly, I'll try".

"I used to love you with a love that was all encompassing. Before we were married, when I wasn't with you, I would think of ways to get you to smile at me, to get your green eyes to flash, to get you to stamp your foot in indignation at something I had said. Anything to prove that you felt a glimmer of something for me, at that point love didn't matter, I just wanted there to be something I could hold on to, fool that I am. And when I was with you, Scarlett, how I loved to be around you, I felt as though I were in the presence of the most precious Godly creation. Just a smile from you sent my heart reeling…seeing your face, hearing your laugh, smelling your skin, all those things, permanently embedded in my subconscious, were enough to get me through during the war." Scarlett was surprised at how calm and composed Rhett was, swirling and dipping her gracefully across the ballroom, relating his feelings as though he were narrating a story that had no relevance to him.

"and when I came back, well, I've told you before that I would have killed Frank had he not died and I would have done it without remorse. Don't look so shocked Scarlett! You know what it's like to kill someone who was taking something that you cherished, in your case it was money; and what have you ever treasured more than money? In my case it was you and my love had only grown stronger over the years."

"When I proposed, I thought, this is our chance. I loved you Scarlett, and I was incredibly fond of Wade and Ella. I would have done anything for you…but you wouldn't let me prove my love. There was a time when I believed with all my being that we could be happy…but then there was Ashley!" Rhett let out a soft and humorless chuckle. "Always Ashley. And how it cut me to know that you would have preferred to be sitting opposite him at the dinner table, prefer him occupying my space in our bed", Rhett shook his head as though he was trying to clear the memory.

"Oh, but Rhett! I didn't want Ashley! It was never real, only a child's fantasy that I kept alive a-as a, a I don't know, maybe a connection to carefree life before the war, but it wasn't real, it was never real. I know that now, why can't you understand?" Scarlett was pleading with him, but she no longer cared. What did pride matter when she was losing the person that she cared about most in the world?

"I understand Scarlett, let me continue. When I realized my love wouldn't be returned by you, I poured all of it into Bonnie. She was so precious and I was the centre of her universe and I could pretend Bonnie was you, before the war and poverty turn you bitter and hard. She accepted my love freely and without question, in fact I gave her every bit of my love and when she passed, it was gone." Rhett cleared his throat and looked down at Scarlett.

"Now do you understand how my love wore out? My heart is now but an empty shell, if you place your ear up close, you may even hear the ocean" Rhett let out a bitter laugh at the stricken expression on Scarlett's face.

Realising that her efforts had been futile thus far, Scarlett changed tactics.

"Oh Rhett, if only you knew how much Wade and Ella missed you! They feel as though you have deserted them".

Don't use the children against me Scarlett" Rhett threatened, the first note of anger in his voice, "I won't stand for it".

"I am not trying to manipulate you Rhett, I am merely expressing how desperately they miss you. After everything that has happened, how can you expect them to stand it?"

"I didn't leave them Scarlett, I left you, I left our excuse for a marriage. I'll be back to visit them. I love them too much to stay away from them long. Why didn't you bring them with you?" Rhett questioned sardonically.

"I didn't think it would be appropriate" Scarlett responded stonily knowing that Rhett thought her mention of the children was a ploy to win him over.

"Ah, you didn't think it appropriate for the children to be witness to your attempt to recapture my heart?" Rhett questioned with one eyebrow raised sardonically.

"Just as well. It's useless Scarlett, this plan of yours. My love is not a child's plaything that can be cast away and retrieved at whim. For you are a child Scarlett and you have pushed my love aside too many times and so it is no longer available for you to crush in your careless grasp"

Scarlett was unsure of what hurt the most, the finality of his words or the cool, detached way in which he delivered them.

"But Rhett" she pleaded "I didn't know I had your love, if only you had told me!"

"We've been over this Scarlett, and I do hate to repeat myself. Do you think you'd have realised what I was offering? I offered you the world and yet you wanted the moon. You wanted the unobtainable when a chance of blissful happiness was being proffered on a silver platter" Rhett sighed "You don't love me Scarlett, you only want what you can't have, that's all you've ever wanted".

Scarlett began to protest, the words forming on her lips, but the waltz had ended. Rhett bowed politely and released her hand, striding purposefully out of the ballroom; leaving her as desolate and alone as the child he accused her of being.

Review please :)


	4. Chapter 4

Back to the present time for this chapter, I hate the depressing stuff

Back to the present time for this chapter, I hate the depressing stuff

**Disclaimer**: I own none of the original characters

Hope you enjoy, this chapter probably doesn't have much substance but it's good for the flow of the plot

Please review, even if you hate it! I love hearing from you!

It wasn't that he didn't like Beau Wilkes. Rhett mused as he walked swiftly down the stairs. In fact, Beau was a very likeable gentleman. He was respectful and kind, generous and accomplished and had really turned the lumber business around when he was old enough to assist his father. So much so that neither of them were to ever worry about money again.

No it wasn't Beau that had Rhett so perturbed. After all Beau had grown up around Rhett and he was very fond of the boy, he really couldn't ask for a better son-in-law. The word made Rhett wince slightly.

When thinking in a clear-headed manner, Rhett himself could recognize that Ella and Beau were well-suited. The loving attention that Melanie had showered on Beau in his formative years allowed him to be an outgoing and confident child, and from there, a charismatic and well-liked young man. Both of them enjoyed many of the same pastimes and as he'd always thought, like should marry like.

Rhett walked swiftly and quietly, as he always had, to the door of the parlor. Thinking it unusual that the door was closed, Rhett boomed "Where's the happy couple?" and suddenly opened the parlor doors and stepped inside.

If Rhett was hoping to find an excuse to haul Beau out of their house, he was to be bitterly disappointed. For the scene he happened upon was not the love scene he had concocted in his mind but rather one of quiet domesticity.

Ella was sitting in the Settee and Beau in the armchair. On Ella's lap was an open book of Shakespeare and on her face was a look of startled surprise. It appeared as though Beau had been listening with rapt attention to Ella's recital, for though he knew all the Shakespeare plays as well as she did, there was nothing he enjoyed more than listening to the lilting sound of Ella's voice, which dipped and weaved through the verse as though it were involved in a lyrical dance.

Beau turned to Rhett with a questioning look in his eyes for he had only mentioned to Ella that very day that he could no longer live without her permanently by his side. How was it that her father knew already?

"Daddy, how did you find out so quickly? Have you been listening at the door again?" Ella questioned with laughter in her eyes, knowing who actually would have been listening at the door.

"I once told your mother that eavesdroppers often hear highly entertaining and instructive things. Since that moment she has taken my advice to heart and often delighted in the art of eavesdropping. Much more polite that spying, you see, or that's what she likes to think." Rhett said with a wink towards Ella. "that is how I found out about your intentions towards my daughter. So is there something you wanted to ask me?" Rhett directed his question at Beau with a raised eyebrow.

"Ah, yes. I would like to…that is to say…I was wondering…" As much as Beau liked Rhett, he was an intimidating presence at the best of times and suddenly the prospect of asking Rhett for Ella's hand was quite frightening, particularly when he looked into Rhett's eyes and noticed a strange gleam in them, although his face was an impassive mask.

Beau glanced at Ella sitting patiently on the settee, who smiled encouragingly at him and it was all the motivation he needed. Beau squared his shoulders and straightened his spine and although he wasn't as tall as Rhett, he only needed to tilt his head slightly to maintain eye contact, to prove he wasn't intimidated.

"Sir, I love Ella more than anything in the world and I know we will make each other happy, of that I have no doubt. I would like to ask for Ella's hand in marriage and your blessing as her Father"

Scarlett who had just entered the room thought Beau acted admirably considering the way Rhett was staring him down. "For heavens sake! Must he intimidate the poor boy? He already knows what his answer will be!" Scarlett thought with a small shake of her head.

"You have my blessing" Rhett pronounced with a nod after what seemed to be an exaggeratedly long pause. "And might I say that you have made a wonderful catch" Rhett added to Beau with a wink in Scarlett's direction.

Rhett glanced toward Ella who was laughing gleefully and squeezing Beau's hand.

"You're leaving me" he stated morosely and dipped his head in an exaggerated display of self-pity, trying to make her feel badly about getting married at such a young age.

Ella, having grown up around Rhett knew that he would rather chop off his hand than truly indulge in self pity but also knowing that his outward emotions usually masked those he truly felt, she looked into his eyes and said "I'll never truly leave you, I always be your little girl".

With a smile Rhett lifted her off the floor in a hug that had her gasping for breath and then placed her gently down next to Beau.

He cleared his throat gruffly a few times. "Getting sentimental in your old age Mr Butler" Scarlett teased.

"No, my throat is just dry, nothing that brandy won't fix. Shall we celebrate?"

And so they toasted the happy couple and both Rhett and Beau noticed with a joint roll of their eyes, that Scarlett and Ella already had the wedding plans underway.


End file.
